Latest / The Bob Lefsetz Podcast / Jeff Pollack

Transcript

Jeff Pollack · The Bob Lefsetz Podcast

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, brocome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: My guest today is Jeff Pollock, media consultant and now
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: a producer of music documentaries. Jeff, good to have you here.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Thank you, Bob. It's a pleasure appreciate it. Okay, tell
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: me how the Paul McCartney Rick Rubin three to one
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: series on Hulu came together. Well, that's a it's a
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: great question. It happened all during COVID and Rick and
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: I have been friends for a while. We were sort
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: of emailing back and forth. He had just seen the
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: Laurel Canyon doc that we had done and really liked it.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: And I sort of said, well, hey, have you ever
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: thought about producing a doc? Would you like to do that?
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: And he goes, well, that would be fun. Who would
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: you want to do? So, as music guys do we
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: we went back and forth saying what would you want
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: to do? Here's a short list. The thing Rick said
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: to me was I'd want to do something somebody well known,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: but tell stories about that person that aren't widely known,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: you know. So um we decided to We both agreed
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: on Paul McCartney and I said, you know, he's never
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: gonna do it. I mean, this is like just you know,
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Aaron Rodgers pass with the clock running out. It's just nice.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: It's not gonna happen. But you know, let's approach him
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: with and and this was Rick's idea, was really focusing
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: on Paul the musician, not a Beatles documentary, something really
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: about the bass player, you know, the arranger, the piano player,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: the you know, the drummer, and uh, with his third
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: solo album coming out, we said, let's let's ask him.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: So we ended up reaching out to Scott Roger, his manager,
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: and you know, we didn't hear back for a little bit.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: And then did you have a pre existing relationship with
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Paul or did Rick have a pre existing relationship with Paul?
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: Of course you know Scott Roger, but was this the
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: first time around the merry go round with Paul. Well,
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: I interviewed Paul in nine, but he wouldn't know me
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: from Adam, So yeah, there was nothing there. And Rick
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: had had met maybe a lunch or something with Paul,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: but he certainly weren't friends. They were not friends. Okay,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: So continuing the narrative, you contact Scott Roger, McCartney's manager,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: and and so um Scott says, well, look, I'll run
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: it by Paul, but you know, he's got a lot
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: going on, and I you know, this is sort of
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: the process you realize, Bob, when you're making an impossible
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: request that's never going to be a yes. So then
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: I get the email back from me says Paul wants
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: to talk to Rick. So they end up having a
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: phone conversation. And I get a two word email back
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: from Rick which says he's in And so I'm saying
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: to myself, now, what this is COVID And oh, by
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: the way, he's in America on August fift and and
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: he can only do it then. And I looked at
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: the calendar, Bob, and it was three weeks away. So
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: of course all the planning that you would ordinarily do
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: on something like this, and the months it would take
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: to prepare have gone out the window. So we sort
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: of four walled a barn in in the Hampton's were
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Paul has this place. I didn't even go because of COVID.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: We had like three people on the set and we
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: brought everything in. We had the tapes shipped over from
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Abbey Road, which is sort of the first time they'd
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: ever left Abbey Road, and that's why if you see
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: the series, you can see Paul listening like he hasn't
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: heard it in a long time. And that's in fact
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: the case. Like, okay, just to be technical here, did
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: they ship the actual tapes or were they digital copies? Oh?
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: They were digital copies. Copies yeah, and so um. And
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: of course Rick being a producer and went through all
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: of them and had all these incredible questions for him.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: So we shot for fifteen hours, um, and amazingly we
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: were able to do all the post production on it
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: and get it to Hulu. So, I mean literally everything
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: takes so long these days, and we went from him
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: saying yes to being on Hulu in eleven months. Okay,
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: let's start back at the beginning. You talked to Rick.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: You say, hey, Paul, you call Scott Roger. Paul speaks
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: to Rick. Well, we both know there are a lot
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: of other things. How did you make the deal with Hulu?
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: And how where did the money come from? They pay
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: a hundred percent? What happened? Really good questions. So Rick
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: has a deal with Film forty five, which is a
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: film production company who has a deal with Endeavor Content.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: So Endeavor Content said, okay, will fund the shoot, and
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: it wasn't inexpensive because of COVID Bob. I mean, it
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: was just like we had to do everything in an
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: incredibly short period of time and then uh, once we
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: had some trailers cut, uh, Endeavor Content could go out
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: and sell it. So they basically fronted it for us.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: And then how did it end up at Hulu? Well,
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Hulu was very keen on the idea, and of course
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: Disney had already made the deal for the Peter Jackson film. Uh,
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: so I think they really liked the idea of having uh,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: you know, a real place with you know, McCartney and
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: you know, three months before the uh the Beatles film
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: came out. So I just I just think, you know,
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: Disney kind of doubled down on the Beatles and McCartney.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: So lucky for us. Okay, So they fronted the money.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Can I ask how much money it was to do
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: the thing lock Stock and Barrel, I can't share that,
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: but but it was not inexpensive, Okay. So in the
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: deal with Hulu, were you in the block or did
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: you retain certain rights that would ultimately put you in
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: the block. Oh, we were in the black and um,
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: you know it's um, definitely. I mean it was something
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: that was it was extraordinary because so little was being
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: made during COVID. I think it was really a sigh
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: of relief for everybody that there could be something brand
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: new that was fresh. So it worked out. Okay, so
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: it's been It's on Hulu now because we bean and
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: if you will say, if you have a subscription to Hulu,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: you can watch it. Would we anticipate it would be
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: on other platforms available in other distribution outlets at some
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: point in the future, you know. I I don't know
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: the length of the deal. I know it's on Disney
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: Plus outside the US because there isn't the Hulu brand
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: outside the US, but um, you know, streamers essentially licensed it.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: Like our Sinatra doc which originally was on HBO in
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: All or Nothing at All, is now on Netflix, so
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: you can actually watch it on Netflix. So it's a
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: good question, Bob. I think it's a you know, there's
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: a there's a term, you know, uh, multi year term
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and then and then it devolves to to somebody else
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: depending on the deal. So what does McCartney say about
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: the finished product? I think he really liked it. I
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: think he heard from a lot of people that it
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: was surprising that it was. You know, it just felt
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: different than a lot of the standard docks being shot
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: in black and white, being intimate, um, being leisurely, like
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: somebody was in the studio. You've been in enough studios
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: to know that the pacing in a studio is slower,
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: and this was slower. You know, this was Rick Rubin
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: in the studio asking questions and um, it really was, um,
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: a very good experience. And I think that that Paul
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: came off so humbly, you know, he really came off
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: great and uh um you know. So you know, we
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: were lucky that he said yes, I'm proud of it.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: With such a brief period three weeks before production, did
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: Rick feel that if he had to do it over again,
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: he would have done it differently, had enough time prepared.
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: I mean, it was great, but what went through his mind, Well,
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: he did an extraordinary a he he's an extraordinary amount
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: of prep for it, as you might imagine Bob Lack
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: he would do for you know, doing him the Chili
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Peppers album or something like that. So he went through
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: all the songs that he wanted to ask about and
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: not all of them were obvious ones. You know, he
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: didn't ask, you know, if you're if you're asking about tomorrow,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: never knows you know, you're you're You're not necessarily asking
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: questions about the biggest hits. But he had a very
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: good sense for each song. We shared song ideas, we
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: shared ideas, but you know, very much of the creative
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: vision was Rix. To give credit here, Rick, Rick really
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: had an idea of what he wanted to do. He
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: was obviously he knew everything about the Beatles, and he
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: was very intrigued, mostly about the choices that the band
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: or Paul made at a particular question. He was very curious, like, well,
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: why would you decide to do that instead of this?
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: And I think as of you or it was really
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: interesting to watch that. So you have a Grand Slam
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: with Paul McCartney. Are their plans to do more? I
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: don't think so. Um, you know, you never say no,
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: but I don't think there's anything coming. I think we
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: all felt that, you know, we captured particular period for
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Paul in a in a new way, which was great.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: I guess I'm asking do you have any more plans
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: you and Rick to do more with different interview subjects.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: Good question. He is a very busy guy, and I'm
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: pretty busy myself. We've talked about it, but there's nothing
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: specific at this point. Okay, now, ten years ago, you
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: switch from radio consultancy to this music doc world. What
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: was going through your head? Why did you make that switch?
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: You know, Bobby, I was always a music guy. I
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: mean I was, even though I was in radio. I
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: wasn't a guy who considered himself a radio guy. I
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: was a music guy. I got into radio in college
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: because I loved music. The idea of playing music for
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: other people that I thought was great and might engage
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: other people was something that I really liked, and it was.
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: It was one of those non commercial um college stations
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: where we played jazz and classical music and we played
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: a little bit of rock, and I swore that I
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: had never worked at a radio station. I would play
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: anything commercial like Elton John. And then, of course two
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: years later, I am but so much for that. But
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: I I enjoyed that so much, and I was able
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: to get a part time job. I was in Denver
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: and I went to University of Denver, and I worked
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: at a commercial station. It would have been sort of
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: like the cam Et of Denver, and I worked there
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: part time and then I got the Overnight show. And
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: there was one profound thing that happened to me during
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: that experience, which I've always thought about, is I saw
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: sort of the legendary DJ and Denver. His name was
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: Bill Ashford. He was sort of like the Bert Mitchell
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: read or that kind of person that really is Scott
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: Muti of Denver. And what year are we in? This
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: is in the seventies, early seventies, and I, uh, well,
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: mid mid seventies. And at this point, um, I saw
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: this guy kind of discarded, like he didn't fit in
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: with the times. So he was replaced. And he was
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: a great music guy, and I was saying to myself,
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: I guess I better think about playing music other people
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: want to hear rather than just what I want to hear.
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: And that was a very big step for me. So
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Elton John was on the radio, Bob there he was,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: and I love great guy, but it wasn't what I
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: wanted to play. John culture, That's where I came from.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: But so I worked my way up and worked for
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: commercial stations. Okay, let's I want to get to all that.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: But first, what closed the transition ten years ago. It's
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: a good question because I had worked in the nineties.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: I had started and worked on thirty to forty films
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: as a music supervisor. I was lucky enough to be
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: the guy people called who would once in a while
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: get one of his music choices in there, because it
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: was always you know, the director's daughter or the producer's
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: brother or everybody. Of course, we're experts on music. So
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: the idea you can actually get a song into a
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: movie that you thought actually might work, uh was. It
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: was nice to have happened. So I worked on a
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: bunch of UM films, some of which you actually even
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: have heard of, and and I noticed how interesting it
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: was as I observed what producers did and everything else
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: and the storytelling involved. It reminded me of my early
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: days in radio, which is all about storytelling. It's about
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: putting music together and storytelling. And I was lucky because
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: I met Frank Marshall on a UM some event we did.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: And it turns out that Frank, who was obviously a
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: very well known producer, worked with Spielberg and still does
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: for all those years. And you know your audience would
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: know him from the born Identity films and the Jurassic
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: UH films and everything else, but that his father was
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: a professional musician. His father, Jack Marshall, played with Chet
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: Baker and Sinatra and everything else. And Frank always loved music,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: and I said, why don't we do some music docs?
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: I said, you don't get paid much, but it's sure
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: is fun. And so we ended up coming together and
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: tackling the most difficult one to begin with, which which
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: was Sinatra. So we worked several years on that. I
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: and you know, it's a learning process, and I learned
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: that I have kind of a knack for doing this
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: and I really love doing it. And it's you know,
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: it's UM having the relationships to be able to talk
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: to the estates and talk to the people and have
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: them trust you and believe that you're not going to
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: just make a film that UM is going to trivialize
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: or or or do things that are gossipy. I'm not
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: a gossip guy, I said. If you want to traffic
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: and gossip, then i'm your Then I'm not your guy.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: If you want to talk about music and songwriting and arranging,
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: you know, I mean, like our Johnny Cash film, we
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: did it does deal with his drug issues, but only
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: as it relates to his touring and his music. I
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: I just that's not the stuff I'm interested in, you know. Okay,
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: so you do the SATRU uh doc. At what point
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: do you push radio aside? It was happening. I sort
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: of evolved. I went from radio to still working with
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: radio and doing uh the music supervision and was working
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: with with Tom Preston who you know, and Judy and
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: van at at MTV and I worked with them for
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: a long time as a consultant and as a music
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: I and obviously music went away, so I, you know,
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: I shifted my responsibilities and then I worked for Spotify
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: for a lot of years. I was always interested in
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: sort of the new platform that would expose music. I've
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: always been very curious about that. And radio became less
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: of a priority for me. I just didn't enjoy it
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: as much. It didn't get me excited like it was
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: when I was a program director. When I was a
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: program director in Philadelphia, it was so exciting and creative,
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: and we had a lot of competitors, you know, and
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: you had to be really good to get people to
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: listen Deer station. And suddenly when I could buy my competitor. Uh,
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: then the it wasn't as challenging. You know, when when
• 17:10
  Speaker 1: the when the when the ownership rules changed, you know.
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: So okay, let's go back to the beginning. You're from
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: l A, right. What did your parents do for a living?
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: My both my parents are from the Midwest. I was
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: born here. I don't have anybody in entertainment in the
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: family at all, you know. Um, I have two brothers
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: and two sisters. My father was a corporate lawyer, and
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: my mom was uh, you know, a um, a wife
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: and a mom and a brilliant woman who inspired me greatly. Um.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: And if there are five kids, where are you in
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: the hierarchy? I'm fourth out of five? And what did
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: the other four do these days? Why did their lives
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: play out? My oldest brother is retired and he was
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: in the vending business. Uh whatever that is. I'm not
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: sure what it was, still don't know what is. But um,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: my sister is a psychologist. My brother was a Supreme
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: Court justice in Hawaii, in the state of Hawaii, so
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: he was a judge and he just retired from the bench.
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: And because of forcible retire they have age limits there.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: I wish they had him here for our for our country.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: Uh and um, and my youngest sister teaches at the
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: in northern California. So what what kind of kid will
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: you growing up? Growing up? Were you the kind of
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: kid who was alone? We remember the group? We are
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: leader of the group. What we like? I had a
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: lot of behavioral issues. Let us say I had gotten
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: a lot of trouble. My father was going to send
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: me to military school in Vancouver. I can tell you.
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: I mean I think on Victoria Island. That's how far
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: away that that guy won me away. So but my
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: mother wouldn't let him do it. Thanks to her, she
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: thought it would kind of break the spirit. But you know,
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: I got in a lot of trouble, but it was
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: nothing really malicious. I just was, you know, like most
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: kids looking for attention and doing things like that. You
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: could just go a little deeper, you know. What was
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: your bad behavior? Uh? Well? Um? I was chucked out
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: of three schools elementary schools, um and demoted at one
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: of them, another one in junior high. So they just
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: didn't like my behavior. You know, I just wouldn't listen
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: to anybody. I I'm not very good with authority, so
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: I I probably learned that from Jim Morrison. I just
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: had a big problem with the Actually, one of the
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: schools actually made you repeat a year. They wanted to
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: humiliate me, so they I was I think I was
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: in eighth grade and they made me go to a
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: seventh grade home room. And as a kid, that is
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: so embarrassing and humiliating. So but yeah, what happens in
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: the high school, Well you start to figure it out.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: You start to figure it out. In around eleventh grade,
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: I figured, okay, so I can do these fun things
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: I want to do and start I started a club
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: called the Lizard Legion in high school, inspired by Jim Morrison,
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: and and signed up two people without them knowing what
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: the club was about. I mean, those are the kinds
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: of things that I figured out how to do. Okay,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: I'm interested. So what was the Lizard Legion and what
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: was your goal? And what how how did it play out? We? Uh,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: we're protesting the eating of iguanas as a delicacy in
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: South America. And I mean the whole thing, Bob was
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: just me spoofing the administration and trying to get them
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: to um and I gotta I gotta a sponsor. Who
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: was a teacher and all that. The administration thought it
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: was a political organization. I thought it was some sort
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: of leftist organization, and it was it was me figuring
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: out how to work the system finally, rather than them
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: throwing me out. I was kind of challenging them with
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: a bit of humor wrapped up in the whole thing.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: You know. It was just like, you know, okay, this
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: is a public or private school. Public, it's a Grand
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: Grant high school, and uh in North Hollywood. Okay, this
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: is what I'm interested in. You know, you're a relatively
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: saw spoken guy, but you have all these relationships and
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: you work those relationships. What are the roots of that
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: activity in that skill? Well, I work hard. I like
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: to all that. Um. I'm not always calling people for favors.
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: I think that you know in in um, I think
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: to call and and tell somebody that you like their
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: record or that hey, you like the show or something. Um.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: You know, there's there's you know, this is a relationship
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: built on people. And if you're always calling just asking
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: for favors or something, Hey can I do a film
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: about this guy? Or can I do this? You know,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: my relationships have always been too I'd like to think
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: somebody could say, hey, do you mind if I send
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: you a copy of this record and tell me what
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: you think or what you think of this single, or
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: you know, would you come to the show and listen?
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: You know, I mean it's I I think it's it's um.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: I value those relationships. I don't burn them. I don't
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: um um. If something is a secret, it's a secret.
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: And um, you know you and I probably are you know,
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: have access to a lot of people sharing stuff with us.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: That's uh block and that's also confidential. And I think
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: you really have to honor those relationships. You have the
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: incentive to start the Lizard Legion. You ultimately had your
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: own radio consultancy with multiple employees where owners depending on
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: how you defined it, dot entrepreneurship, that ability to start things.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Where do you think that came from? I think my father.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: He didn't like the word no very much, and I
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: don't like it either. And it people will tell you
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: who know me, well is doesn't Jeff ever give up?
• 23:46
  Speaker 1: But you know, if I've had no, then I'll say, well,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: maybe there's another way to do it. And I saw
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: that in my home, where my father would talk about
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: somebody said, well, we can't really move put the kitchen. Uh.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: We kept at the oven there in the kitchen because
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: it won't fit there. And he said, well, what if
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: we tried this or try that? He was always it's
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: like what if? And I think the thing that has
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: driven my entire life without me able to to articulate it,
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: but I can now, is the worst somebody can say
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: to you is no. So if that's the case, Bob,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: you've got to go for it. You've got to try.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: You've got to do something that you know. And that's
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: the thing with McCartney. I knew he wouldn't say yes.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: It was impossible, you know, like and then he did.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: And once in a while, something you'll get a yes
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: if you if if you give it a shot. And
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: you know, I have two kids here, and I hope
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: that they've learned that from me, that you know, you
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: really have to give it a go. I mean, the
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: idea of me leaving Philadelphia. When I left Philly to
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: start a consultancy, I had no I idea about being
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: a consultant. I don't even know what that was. I
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: just had a few people call me up after the
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: success in Philadelphia, said Hey, I don't know what you
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: did there? Every can you do it for me? And
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: I said to my parents, like, I guess that's a job.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean, you know, I'll move back
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: home and I'll start a company and then and then
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: you work hard and realized that you can make something
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: of it. Okay. So was there music in the household?
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: Did you grow up with music in the sixties in
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: l A. I mean, that's a privilege. So how connected
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: were you to music before you went away to college. Well,
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: I grew up with classical music, so, um, yeah, my
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: parents weren't into jazz, even though my mom loved Elavizgerald,
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: but she um, but classical we went as a kid.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: So we would go all the time to the Philharmonic.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: We'd go to the Hollyway Bowl. We we we you know,
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: and they had these concerts for young people. So my
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: knowledge of classical music is pretty significant based on just
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: growing up with it, you know. Um. And instead of
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: my mother saying don't be in a rock band, what
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: I was in in high school, she she was excited
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: because it was music for her. It was you know,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: she didn't worry about whether it was you know, classico
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: or something that she would personally like. She liked the
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: fact that I was, you know, in a band. Okay,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: did you take piano lessons or you just pick up
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: the guitar when you saw the Beatles on TV. I
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: took piano lessons, and that I, um, like most people,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: aspired to be in a band. Uh. And I wasn't
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: a particularly good singer, and I was a decent piano player,
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: which is what I ended up being in a band.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: But certainly would not give Bruce horns By any stage
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: fright from me appearing on stage with him. So at
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: what point did you say this is not a future
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: or do you always know playing wasn't a future? You know?
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: When I went to college in Colorado and I was
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: still in a band, and I had a band in college,
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: and then I started working at the college radio station,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: I said, well, wow, this is fun. I can be
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: around music and I don't have to play, and in fact,
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: I get to share what I think is good. So
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: I could play Billy Holiday and then I could play
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: fair Port Convention, and I could play all these things
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: that I loved. And it was a non commercial station.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: So it's a blessing and we're no ratings. Uh, And
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: so that was really what changed it for me as
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: I realized I could still be around music and uh,
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: but wouldn't have to necessarily be in a band. Okay,
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: in the sixties, before you went away to Colorado, did
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: you go to a lot of shows by a lot
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: of records. Oh? Yes, I was, you know, I mean
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: I love music and I was heavily influenced by it.
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: Um you know, um growing up in l A. Bob,
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: you go to shows earlier. It's sort of interesting. It
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: is ridiculous if you look at some of the gigs
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: for some of these famous sixties bands where they played.
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: I mean, you could go to high school and it
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: would be the doors. Jefferson Airplay, a whole list of
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: groups playing because they didn't have any place to play,
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: you know then, and they were just getting going. So
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: if you look at what's really interesting, if you I'm
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: doing a film on Jim Morrison next, and if you
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: do the look at the first six months of nineteen
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: sixty seven before like my Fire really took off. They're
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: playing teen centers, they're playing high schools. And then suddenly
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: in the second half after you know, Sullivan and some
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: of the other things. Suddenly they're playing these much larger arenas.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: But I was lucky because I could see a lot
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: of these bands player. I saw the doors played at
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: the Hollywood Bowl. That was my first big show. Wow.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: So why go to college in Colorado? Well, let me
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: just say that my grades weren't very good. Bob. I
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: would say that the Lizard Legion and other activities led
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: to a less of an academic focus for me. And
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: so I suddenly found that at the end of my
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: senior year that my grades were pretty bad. And um,
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: the options for this young valley boy weren't great. I
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: was not going to be going to the Ivy League.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: So I got into University of Denver, but only after
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: they rejected me. And then my father wrote a letter
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: and they put me on parole because they didn't think
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: well the scott obviously with these and these grades were
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: not good, you know. Uh. And then of course i've
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: you know again, like the story I mentioned about, you know,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: going from eighth grade to seventh grade home room. Um,
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: when you're on probation, then I made the dean's list. Yeah, well,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: because they're gonna you don't don't tell me I'm stupid
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: or I can't do it. Don't don't do that to me.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: So you mean I have to apply myself. Okay, I'll
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: apply myself. So I went to school for three years,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: fell in love with radio, or at least music on
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: the radio, and never finished. What your parents have to
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: say about not finishing where they were extremely unhappy with that.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: They didn't care what I did, but they did not
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: They didn't like the fact because for them, of course,
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: it was very important. And for my mom, who went
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: to college, um, it was an automatic for you know,
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: somebody of her generation to go to college, so she
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: really felt it was super important. Okay, so you left
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: school because he had a job offer. Yes. In fact,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: I saw a professor of mine pumping gas as a
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: second job, and I said, well, if I got a job,
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: should I just take it? And like Evison, so I
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: got a full time job doing the overnight show. Okay,
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: did you pitch them? How did you actually get the job? Oh?
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: They they heard me on the college station. And it's
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: much less than it used to be, Bob. But college
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: radio was a great farm club for commercial radio. A
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: lot of people worked there, and you know, if you
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: were in a city and you had a part time
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: job open, where would you go? There weren't a million
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: people around, So you listened to some guy on the
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: college station. He goes, okay, he's okay, I'll hire him.
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: You know, you remember how much they were paying you?
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: Oh uh, I think it was. I do know. My
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: first full time job, I remember in when I moved
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: into Mexico after working overnight in Denver, I was being
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: paid five a month. I remember that. Okay, so let's
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: get the steps right. You're in your overnights in Denver. Yeah,
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: And when do you quit college and how do you
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: end up in New Mexico. Well, I couldn't, you know,
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: I mean, I stopped going to class because I couldn't
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: you six nights a week, thirty six hours. You know.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: I was living with four other roommates. They're all girls,
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: and and I wasn't I didn't have a relationship with
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: any of them. But they were noisy as hell, and
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, you know, it was a not a good situation.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: So school just kind of disappeared, and I got a
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: full time job, and then I got off to start
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: a brand new station in New Mexico. And so the
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: FIS looked good to me because it was way more
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: than what I was getting. I don't know what it was.
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: But okay, well, how did you end up living with
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: four women? Probably cheap? You know. The reason I'm asking
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: is do you have a natural affinity with women? A
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: lot of guys really don't. Well, I really like women
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: and respect women. And um, I grew up in a
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: house where there weren't any traditional roles. Really. I mean,
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: my father and mother both cooked, they both did the dishes,
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: they both you know, I mean, it wasn't I didn't
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: need to relearn. Uh you know, my mom was brilliant,
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: you know, in terms of the way she was. So
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: I it's not like I had to make a readjustment
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: to kenyes that women were as smart or smarter than
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: men are. So I always, I guess I always got
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: along well with with women. Okay, So where New Mexico
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: is the station and what plays out there? Albuquerque, New Mexico.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: Um and uh we. I was there for about two
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: years and then got a job offered to go leave
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: there and go back to the big FM rock station
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: in Denver, which is still their KBP. I that was
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: sort of like the one of the big stations in
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: the West, and so I took that job because I
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: also missed Denver. I really loved Denver, and you know
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: it's I don't need to tell you it's fantastic. Colorado
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: is the best, and I could go back there, and
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: I don't know. New Mexico was interesting, but it's the desert.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: So okay, you go back to Colorado. What's the step
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: After Denver? I get hired by a guy calls me
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: up and says, we have this job opening to be
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: a program director. And I had never been a program
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: director before. I was a music director, uh in the
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: lovely city of Fresno. And I said, and I'm from
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: l A, so I know about Fresno. I said, I'm
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: not going to Fresno. He goes, you want to be
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: a program director. I said, yes, You're going to Fresno. Okay,
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: So off I went. And it was a It was
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: this radio station, UH called Kino FM. And then six
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: months after that, I ended up being promoted to work
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: for a company owned by Bill Drake and Jean Channel
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: called Drake Chanlton. Of course, Bill Drake as you know
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: as the radio pioneer, the guy who Boss Radio and
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: all that came from. And I ended up working for him,
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: and it was impossible not to learn uh from somebody
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: like that about radio because I really didn't. I was
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: really doing um adopting a lot of the things that
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: he did until I met him. You know, Okay, you
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: go to work for Drake Chanelle and uh so continue,
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: how do you ultimately end up in Philadelphia? Yeah? And
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: and just to say you asked about consulting. The interesting
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: thing about working for Directional it was I was sort
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: of a consultant working for them, traveling to these small
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: markets all over the country. I mean, I wasn't going
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: to Detroit. I was going to Sall for Louisiana. You know, Hey,
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: here's a guy from Drake Chanale. He's gonna tell us
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: what we can do. So and then I got a
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: job offer to work uh at w MMR in Philadelphia.
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: And I told my parents I never lived in Philly before,
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: And I said, all right, you've asked him what I'm
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: gonna do with my life. They've had three program directors
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: at this station in the last two years. I'll go there,
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: I'll get fired, and then I'll come home and get
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: a real job. I promise my parents goes Okay, that
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: sounds sensible. Because I said, I'll just be another one
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: of those losers that they hire and get rid of.
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: And I went there and the guy who's when he
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: did the job interview was Metromedia at the time. The
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: guy goes, well, you're pretty young. What makes you think
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: you can do this? And I said, I remember this
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: quote verbatim Bob. I said, it's not how long you
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: play the It's not it's not how long you play
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: the guitar, it's how you play it. And he goes, oh, okay,
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: So I got the job and we're okay. So you
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: get the job and you're no longer on the air. Correct,
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: no longer on the air. And I didn't miss it.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: I I you know, I you know it was It
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: felt like it's something that was there. But suddenly I
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: go to a station that has dead last one point
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: two ratings in Philadelphia, barely on the air, and this
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: is the Legacy Great station. There. There's two other rock stations,
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: uh w Y SP ANDQ. And when I got there,
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: I was just like, l a, oh, this guy doesn't
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: know Philly, he doesn't know anything, blah blah blah. So
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: I come there and uh, Larry Maggot Electric factory, famous promoter.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: I have a meeting with him. He looks, he kind
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: of rolls his eyes, like, okay, here's the latest in
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: the series of And I said, I'd like to promote
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: some concerts. He goes, sure, sure, sure, sure. So the
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: week I get there, one guy's got Billy Joel, one
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: guy's Bruce Frinkstein and goes, I'll tell you what, We've
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: got Jehan lu Ponti playing the Tower Theater. And I
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: said I'll take it because it was like, you know,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: because they were they weren't going to give me anything good,
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: you know, they just so And it was all based
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: on on ratings. So I got there, you know, you
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: had to be again, I was too young to be scared.
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: I suppose and fired ten people my first week there. Um,
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: I didn't. I didn't like that part of it at all,
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: but I knew with the people I had, I couldn't
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: go forward. I hired a bunch of people. The evening guy,
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: I wasn't sure whether I should keep him or not.
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: He introduced to SO, so, my name is Mark Goodman.
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: I said, well, Mark, you're gonna have to do better
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: than you're doing man, you know, So I kept him
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: and but it was very interesting because what I realized
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: about the BMMR, and maybe because it was I was
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: an outsider. I realized that people still loved the station.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: They had great affection for the station. They wanted it
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: to be successful. So I said, okay, I'm going to
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: bring back all the famous DJs. That's the first thing
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: I did, and they go. Michael Tearson's back doing evenings,
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: Joe Banna Donna. I met Joe Banna Donna, who was
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: the afternoon drive guy. He'd been fired the week before
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: I got there. I said, you are rehired. Okay, I
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: know you've got severance, good for you, but you're now rehired.
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: And I what happened was I changed the station internally,
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: Bob and I. But it was camouflaged by bringing back
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: all the old jocks and bringing back all the heritage
• 40:50
  Speaker 1: of the station. It was and I wasn't doing it
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: really consciously, more than just saying, hey, these people are great.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: Let's bring back what's great about the station. But internally,
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: let's change what we're playing. And every time I went
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: to Philly, uh, when I was doing the interview, because well,
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: you know, this is not a rock town, I go really,
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: I said, I'm from California. We've got a bunch of
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: rock stations. I said, I don't care. We're going to
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: rock the station. And instead of being like this quasi acoustic,
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: you know, boring station, and the station thundered on the
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: you know, it was absolutely rocking, and people go, this
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: guy clearly doesn't understand Philadelphia. You don't get it. It's
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: you don't get it. So the rating was rocketed because
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: of this guy you didn't know anything. It's like literally,
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: you know, instead of you know. But the interesting thing
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: was we didn't strip out the the what mattered. We
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: didn't strip out the culture. We didn't strip ove. I mean,
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: we still played obscure Springsteen's songs or Graham Parker or
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: you know talking. I mean, it's not like we we
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: just learned to balance those with songs people wanted. It
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: was sort of like, you know, let's let's pull people
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: in with this and then then we can be interesting
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: and do this and we won't lose our character. And
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: so um people really connected with the station. The station
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: just rocketed two and we just clabored the two stations.
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: Within four months, we had beat both other stations, and
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: then we ended up getting ratings that were almost a
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: seven share in Philly, and I said, it is not
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: going up from here. It is going to go down
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: from here, and everybody's gonna start saying what you do wrong?
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: What did you change? You obviously shifted something and start
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: questioning you. And so I quit when the station went
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: at was at its height. People go people don't quit
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: when this stage, when you become quote a consultant or
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: work for yourself, whatever it is, you got to leave
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: a losing proposition, and then started you can't leave when
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: you're on top. I said, I'm out of here. So
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: a year and a half later, I moved back to California. Okay,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: you quit. When did you tell me how you ultimately
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: got what you were talking earlier? It seems like you
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: got the client first and then decided to become a consultant.
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: How did that play At the very beginning in the
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: genesis of it? Well, I started having calls for to
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: move to First of all, kal O West called me
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: and said, do you want to become program director of
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: the station? I said not really, and the guy was astounded.
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: I said, w MMR is a great station. Why would
• 43:49
  Speaker 1: I leave that station? It's not really. And and because
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: I'm from l A, Bob, it wasn't like I gotta
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: move to l A the big time. I said, yeah,
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: you mean move home. Yeah, I'll move home. But so
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: I had a So then w P l J New
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: York as you know, Kilos and a station in Rochester,
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: New York called me and said we would like you
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: to work for us and tell us how to do
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: what you did in Philly. You know, I said, okay,
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: I quit. So and they were astounded. They couldn't believe
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: that I quit. Could you make as much money consulting
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: three stations as you had being the program director at MMR, Yes,
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: yes it was. It was not a lot more, but
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: it was more. So you're consulting three stations. Yeah, I'm
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: sure at the beginning you were heavily involved. What was
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: your magic that ultimately grew your business? Well, I had
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: three stations. When you start out with l A and
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: New York, you get people's attention and and what happened
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: in Philadelphia really was a very public turnaround. So people
• 45:09
  Speaker 1: noticed it, and so people knew who I was, and uh,
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: they would call you be incoming calls at that point,
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: you know, you'd say, and I remember even turning one
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: down and Providence goes, you're turning me down because you're
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: too tired. I said, I'm full. I can't. So then
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: you start the process. Am I gonna build a company?
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: And you hire other people and that that's what happened.
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: And so you go from that to a hundred period
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: of you know, like six years. It was crazy. Okay,
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: so you what is the special sauce that you tell
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: these stations? Was every station different? What is the pollock?
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: You know? Plan? Well? Look, I had I had one
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: big competitor who I liked enormously personally, which was Lee Abrams.
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: And uh, he did things a little bit differently because
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: it's a little easier to send out lists and make
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: everything more um system oriented. Um. I really felt that
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: these stations had to reflect the cities they were in
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: and and and that's what Philly really taught me, because
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: if you went there and listen to the w m
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: R that you have no idea that the guy who
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: was programming the station was from Philip was from Los Angeles,
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: You would have no idea he was as Philly as
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: can be. It sounded like this guy must have grown
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: up in Jersey or something, and and to be fair,
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: I had great people, so they would tell me when
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: I was off base about something, and I did my homework.
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: You know, I talked to tons of people as the
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: old fashioned walk around everywhere, talk to people, what are
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: you listening to? What do you like? You know, and
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: and not not identify who I was, and you'd hear
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: and understand. Not very scientific, but you know, it's still
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: kind of worked. So the secret sauce and I thought
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: about this a lot. I was really producing Bob that
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: station more than programming it. The station was. It was
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: exciting and fun and it did weird things. I was
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: able to get some of my weird sense of humor
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: on the air sometimes where people goes, well what did
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: that mean? And I say nothing. I thought it was
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: funny and I put it on the air and some
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: of the stuff would fall flat. But I mean I
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: remember doing a toast with a steel Ie Span song
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: on who I loved, of course being uncommercial, but I
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: love them. We did a toast for Christmas and I
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: played an acapell a song by them. Because I wasn't
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: afraid that I was going to lose the audience. I
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: just said this would be cool, this would be fun. No,
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: this song doesn't call out this this is but it
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: shows you that if enough is going right, you can
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: break the rules once in a while and still be
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: kind of interesting. So the secret sauce was let people
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: be themselves. If they needed to help with their playlists
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: and if their way out, yes I'd help them figure
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: that out. But I never wanted to lose the character
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: of the city. I wanted the Rochester station to really
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: reflect that, and I cared a lot. I think that's
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: the reason I was able to work in Europe because
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: very early I worked in Europe and Australia and I
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: was so conscious of the culture of those countries. I
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: wanted to know who the who the politicians were and
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: what were the cool places to go, and be able
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: to mention things like that in conversations with people so
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: that they saw that, oh, this guy's not I know
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: at all Yank, this guy isn't like America first, this
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: guy actually cares about So I worked in France early on,
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: I worked in England, and in fact that's one of
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: the reasons I worked for MTV International first before MTV,
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: because they said, well, this guy seems to know Europe
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: really well, which I did. I spent a lot of
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: time there, and I really spent time. I really respect culture.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: I really think that that's a very important part of
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: understanding people. And so um, I think that's uh something
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: I took from Philadelphia with me throughout. Okay, so you
• 49:45
  Speaker 1: start with three stations, essentially every station that comes thereafter
• 49:50
  Speaker 1: they're calling you or you ever marketing yourself. Oh after,
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: after I built a company, I definitely would chase the
• 49:57
  Speaker 1: station or and I would love to take a station
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: away from Abrahams if I could. You know, you know,
• 50:04
  Speaker 1: I said, you've got a lot of stations. I'm just
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: gonna steal this went away from you, you know. So
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: uh we never uh. People couldn't understand why I could
• 50:14
  Speaker 1: be so aggressive on the air or with what I
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: was doing and being polite in person. And just because
• 50:24
  Speaker 1: you're aggressive doesn't mean you have to lose your manners, right,
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: You don't have to be a jerk. So um and
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: and so I think we we we got to a
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: point where we had a lot of stations, and I
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: brought in more people, and then and then the company
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: grew and I started working internationally, which I loved, which
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: was really interesting to me because Okay, before we get there,
• 50:50
  Speaker 1: so it's you. Then you start hiring people who have
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: really big jobs. Tommy Hodges, yes, he's a program director.
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: What is your pitch to these people to leave the
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: stations come work for you? Um? Well, Tommy was the
• 51:08
  Speaker 1: program director in Boston, and I convinced him to take
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: the l A job, the kale Os job. I really
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: needed a program director because I was suddenly like I
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: moved to l A on something like the program director.
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: I'm not the program director. That's not what I signed up.
• 51:27
  Speaker 1: We need a program director. So I had met him
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: and really liked him enormously, and I said, would you
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: take this job and go straight? He came out and
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: then he decided not to come. So I waited a
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: couple of weeks, I said, called him over and said
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: any regrets he goes, yeah, I said, good, come now
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: so he can. That's part of being you know, not
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: giving up on somebody, you know. So he came and
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: then five years after he was at kale O s
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: I said, you know, I said to him, and we
• 52:02
  Speaker 1: did this with with his boss to make sure that
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: he was cool. I said, um, he loved the idea
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: of traveling around and talking to other people, because you know,
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: once you've been at a station for a long time,
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: the idea of traveling and meeting new people and working
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: with other people was very interesting, and and so he
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: joined up uh five years after klaws. How do you
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: decide what to charge the station? There's a going rate
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: and you do by bye bye. Well there was before
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: I started, and there was um and it would be
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: by market size, so you know, it might be a
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: month in Rochester, it might be three K a month
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: and l A, you know, but then the then it
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: changed and you know, the more competitors. The guy goes, well,
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: you know, I I do it for two km months,
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: you know, and you know, so it was it was
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: that kind of after that started happening, and especially when
• 52:59
  Speaker 1: the the rolled around, I saw the writing on the
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: wall goes, okay, so you're gonna let these companies get
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: really big by their competitors and eliminate competition. That doesn't
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: sound like fun, because if I don't have to be
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: great to win, then I don't need to hire anybody.
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: And then I said, okay, that feels like, you know,
• 53:25
  Speaker 1: there's gonna be a timer on how much we're able
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: to do here. Okay, you go from being a guy
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: in Denver to controlling a hundred stations. How does that?
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: You know, you're a guy who grew up in music,
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: you're suddenly meeting your heroes. Well, what did that feel like?
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: And how did what we do take advantage work with that? Well?
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: I think that you he sort of never imagine you're
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: going to meet these people, Bob. You know, if you
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: grow up admiring whoever it was, UM, and at some
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: point their career and your career converges, and that is
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: mind blowing and you need to always be mindful. I
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: don't think I ever lost the perspective of why people, UM,
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: we're excited to meet you if you're an artist. You know,
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: it was the chair I was sitting in. It wasn't
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: like I was a great guy. Okay, now I happened
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: to be somebody who was enthusiastic about music. I wasn't
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: interested in, you know, manipulating any kind of relationship so
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: that you know, I could I feel like I was
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: super powerful or anything else. I I didn't like that game.
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: I don't like that aim. It's not what I'm interested in.
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: I like honestly, being able to tell somebody what you
• 55:08
  Speaker 1: think of their record or or that you're going to
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: be supportive. And so that was that was an interesting moment.
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: But I knew all along those things shift and suddenly
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: if it was radio, and then it was MTV, and
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: then it was Spotify, those gatekeepers. It's a transitory thing, right,
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: and it's uh something that and it's not like radio
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: still isn't super important. It is, but there's so many
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: other platforms doing it that you know, it's something that
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: you you just have to realize that we're your places
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: in the universe. Now, are any of the celebrities real
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: friends or is it all business friends? I have some
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: real friends, um that I They're not a lot, though, Bob,
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: there's not a lot, because give me one or two
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: people might be real friends. I'd rather not mention them
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: by name, um, if you don't mind. But I do
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: have some people who are interested in how my kids
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: are doing, and they remember my birthday and they like
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: to have dinner even if I can't not in a
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: position to you know, those are real friends. And I
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: think you learned that. Look, I had Midwest parents, you know,
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: they not common sense into me. A long time ago.
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: I never was nature, I suppose, especially growing up in
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: a city like this. You know, your you know, your
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: next door neighbor's dad writes on a TV show and
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: you So it wasn't you know, it wasn't remarkable. But
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: I think you know, you know, I really respect the
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: job these people do. They put themselves out there, and
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: I think they recognize that. Um, how I view the process,
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: you know, Okay, Now, certainly at the end of the
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: heyday of rock radio, uh, Jeff McCluskey had his business.
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: Then it was about people can't see my air quotes
• 57:16
  Speaker 1: about owning a record and if you didn't pay him,
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: or it was everybody at this point. Well, I'm just
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: asking you they would keep your record off? To what degree?
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: Did that in fact or did you have to do
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: that your business? I did. It didn't interact with me
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: at all. That wasn't because you because you were already
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: out or you could do it your way. I could
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: do it my way. And also, people know if you
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: are straight, are not, and they knew that that's the
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: way I was, you know, So you know, it wasn't
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: anything that I wasn't on a power trip and I
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: didn't care about that stuff. Okay, do you ever tell
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: an act this is what you need to do on
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: your record? I think it's the problem is like what
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: Jimmy Iving said to me once. He said, if if
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: an artist really wants to have my honest opinion, don't
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: hand me and c D and plastic. I mean, that's perfect,
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: but sometimes people are in the beginning of the project
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: as opposed to the end. I think what you can do,
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: Bob is, look, you have really good ears. I have
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: really good ears because we've done it a long time. Okay,
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: we kind of know what the market likes and doesn't like.
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: We can separate are personal opinion from what perhaps the
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: market opinion might because there's obviously two separate things. But
• 58:56
  Speaker 1: I'll certainly if somebody says, what do you think the
• 58:59
  Speaker 1: lead track ought to be? Or what do you think
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: the single should be? I'm happy to do that. I'm
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: not always right, but you know, if you make an album,
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: you have no clue. I can't tell you how many
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: times people come and here's the single. I go, no,
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: that's not you know, if you're you're involved in making
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: a record, you just cannot I agree totally they have
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: no sense. But the worst have no idea. They have
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: no idea, and so if you can provide a service
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: when I say a service in opinion and say hey,
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: this is what I think the song should be. I
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: remember being backstage at a K rock concert Um, and
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: the label at the time was talking about moving on
• 59:48
  Speaker 1: from Clocks from Coldplay because it wasn't a hit. I said,
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: you are nuts, give it time. That song is a hit.
• 59:59
  Speaker 1: You know what it's like, they're you know the the
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: you know, if it's not happening, let's move on. And
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: it's even worse now, right, It's got to happen right now. Okay,
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: So in your tenure as a consultant, tell me a
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: couple of records that you really feel responsible for making successful.
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: By myself, there was none but um helping gosh. Um.
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: That's interesting. It's a lot of years. I probably can
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: remember more from I think just being an early supporter
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: of of bands that ended up being really good, like Dires,
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 1: Straits or something where you'd go. I remember the Warner's
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: rep from Boston came to see me in Philadelphia and
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: this was the time, Bob that they had every band
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: had a weird name, fabulous poodles, blah, blah blah blah blah,
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: and most of those bands were mediocre. And so I
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 1: go into the place where the record people would wait
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: for you until you were done, you know, talking to somebody,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: and I look around and there's like this librarian. This
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: woman looks like in the library. Because Hi, I'm the
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: Warner's rep. I go, nice to meet you. What do
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: you got? Well, I got this band, Dire Straits, I said,
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: oh my god, another name which is And then you
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: hear Saltan's swing and you flip out because you haven't
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: heard anything like that. So I'd like to think that
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 1: there was a number of circumstances along the way where
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: I would have heard something great and supported it early.
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: I know that I was probably late, like everybody was
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: on never mind, I think I think that was again
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: one of the times when the public was way ahead
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: of the gatekeepers. We were behind, they were ahead. I
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: asked the manager of Nirvana at the time, you remember,
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: Danny Goldberg, well and I and I talked to him
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: a couple of months after. I said, what is happening
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: with this record? He goes, I have no idea, which
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: was the honest way to look at it. It was
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 1: guess what. Sometimes the public is ahead of you, and
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: that's that's what happened. Okay, So tell me how you
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: spread into Europe and Australia. Oh, in Australia, I got
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: a call from Brisbane in nineteen it was the early
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: eighties and he goes, hey, we read about you and
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: our radio records. Uh, we can't pay you anything, which
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: is always a good great sales I've I've used that
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: in the future. I can't can't pay you anything, but
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 1: we'll bring you down here to Australia. And so I said,
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: you know, and of course at that time, what do
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: you have to lose? Right? So you go down see
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: Koala bears for the first time. It's awesome. And in
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: two years I had five clients there in all the
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: major cities. And I guess it's because you know, you
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: had I had an attitude like, well why not, you know,
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: give it a go. Not everything has to be driven
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: by money, you know. I have faith, have faith that
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: something good can happen. You know you don't do today, Bob,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: I don't make music documentaries because it's financially rewarding. I
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: can assure you that there are other ways. Um, but
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: you must have been doing quite well in the heyday
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: of the Consultancy, which ran for a good number of Yes,
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: it did, and I did well, And I'm not complaining.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm I am grateful, and I think that, you know,
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: the fact that I can do something on a band
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 1: that I grew up with like The Doors now, like
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: Jim Morrison, is mind blowing to me. And guess what
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 1: I want to do, Bob is I want to race
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: that image from Oliver Stone's movie I Am Determined. I
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 1: sort of have a little mission in my head and
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 1: about some of these things. And well we'll get a
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: little bit more into that. But once you start making
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: real money, what do you do with it? I but
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: the house, That's pretty much it. And and then I
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: got married and I had less money. So but you know,
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: I I wasn't you know, I was fortunate. Look, I
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: was just a DJ, and I was just a guy
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: worked at a commercial free station. I look at the
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: fact that I could make a good living doing this
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: and to be around music and to meet staying once
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: in a while, that was cool, right. You gotta be grateful. Absolutely,
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: So how did you get into Europe? Europe? Was um,
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 1: I'm trying to think. I remember it was the mid
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: eighties and I started working UM. I did a project
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: for europe One, which was a news outlet, a gigantic
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: national like the BBC kind of of of France, and
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: they were they wanted to start an FM station, So
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 1: I launched an FM hot a C station and and
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: the thing with France, of course, it's a national signal,
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: it's not just Paris goes everywhere. And I started working
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: for a French company and I put on the first
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: station in Moscow, you know, several years later, and in Prague,
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: and it was really amazing being in Eastern Europe and
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: uh being part of it. That's really what I felt like.
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: I was doing something interesting. It wasn't just about up
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 1: UM radio is for for them, it was what they
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: listened to when they were you know, uh, part of
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: the you know, the Iron Curtain and UM when these
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 1: stations came out UM and it was really a part
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: of the new freedom that these these countries had an experience,
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: and it was great to be part of that. Okay,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: now you were in America, were known as an A. O. R.
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: Guy album rock? Was that what you sold around the
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 1: world or did you Taylor the playlist for whatever mark
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, obviously tailored to a degree, But was
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: that the sound you were putting on these varying stations,
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: you know, I think Australia, Yes, they were pretty much
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: rock stations, heavily dominated by Australian bands, of which there
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: were a lot, and like Hanada, Australia had a rule
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: at the time where I think it was of all
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: the music had to be from Australia. That wasn't the
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: case in Europe. But in Europe there were no there
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 1: was no rock. We weren't doing rock there. It was
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: it was pop, it was hot a c um, it
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: was a mixture um. And of course our French network,
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: which we've worked with for a very long time, Skyrock,
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 1: is a hip hop network. So so it was it
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: was like, I mean, I was known as a rock guy,
• 1:07:36
  Speaker 1: but as as I mentioned earlier, I I sort of
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: was a I like rock a lot, but I mean
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: I had other musical interests, you know. Okay, So in
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 1: radio rock radio there's a couple of very specific schisms.
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: One you mentioned was Nirvana, but really an earlier one
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: will put it eighty one, between eighty and eighty two,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: we had this free format station in Pasadena, the last
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 1: free format station in l A. Suddenly Rick Carroll gets involved.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: It's now the rock of the eighties. It's top forty
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 1: of what was then considered alternative and breaks, soft sell
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: Tainted Love and Humanly, Don't You Want Me? And the
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 1: other rock station certainly came et, didn't go on those
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 1: new songs, immediately came et, ultimately flipped format. What was
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: it like being in the trenches when all of a
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: sudden this sound came along. Rick was a very talented guy,
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: Rick Carroll, and he kind of ignored what was going
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: on there and recognized that there was a new sound
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: that he could capitalize that wasn't the heavy rock sound.
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: That there was this sort of pop alternative I guess
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: for a lack of a better term, I hate genre titles,
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: but anyway, um, but he ended up finding that, you know,
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 1: sort of rock stations wouldn't play the Cure and Depeche Mode.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: He did, and they had huge audience and he put them.
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 1: What was interesting is he would put songs in a
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: very quick rotation, but because the music was so different,
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: it was really fresh and and it was one of
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: the sort of extraordinary stories of the eighties. Was that
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: really um it sounded more like a radio station you'd
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: hear in England, frankly or in Australia. It had that
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: you know, that sensibility fun jocks. I mean, it was
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: really a good experience and he was super smart. Okay,
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: But as I say, traditional A O. R. Did not
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 1: go on all those songs, and most of those stations
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: ultimately flipped the classic rock you know, they played the
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: older they were behind there a new market, new station
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: in the market. What was it like being a consultant
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: when all of a sudden this wedge comes in and
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: there hasn't been anything like it for years. Well, we
• 1:10:18
  Speaker 1: played some of those songs on some of the alternative stations,
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: like we played Human League, and you know you can't.
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: It's like country radio deciding not to play little NASAs.
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 1: I mean, what are they like idiots. It's it's a hits,
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 1: It's a gigantic hit and and you can't arbitrarily make
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: judgments like that or you'll go down. You'll go down fast.
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: It's like the Grammys deciding Casey Musgraves or Brandy Carlisle
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: can't be in a particular category. I mean, like who
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 1: is living in a seven and these there, man. I mean,
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 1: that is like ridiculous. And if you talk to any
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: kids and the reason why the kids won't relate to
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: the Grammys, they don't even understand it when you talk
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: about genres, don't even know what you're talking about. They listen,
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: they like it. They either like it or they don't
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: like it. They like Bowie and they like Jake Cole
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 1: and they don't they're not They don't say oh my,
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 1: my son doesn't say, oh Dad, I'm gonna listen to
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: a rock song. Now, they go, I like that song,
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: I don't like it. It's fine, it's cool, it's interesting,
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: you know. And I think that's that kind of mentality
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: that you're referring to. Bob did exist, and it led
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 1: to certain stations becoming completely irrelevant because, you know, if
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: you're just playing to the super super core without trying
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: to expand your audience or at least give them something fresh.
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: I mean, don't you want me what a great single
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: that is. It may not be high art, but it
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: sure is great to listen to, you know, it's sure,
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: and a lot of the Cure songs and everything else,
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 1: so you know, rock rock did have an internal debate
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: about what is rock, which is hard to believe looking
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 1: back now, right it's like, what were you guys thinking?
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: What do you like? I remember when they're saying, well
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: as Coldplay rock or is it is like is a
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: song good or not? Is? Do you like it? Does
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: it fit what you're doing? You know? So okay, let's
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: jump to MTV tell us again. They called you because
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: you had footprint in Europe. Tell us about your history
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: with MTV. Well, I got a call from Tom Preston,
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: who I remained close with today, one of the all
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: time great guys, and he produced me to Bill Rhadi,
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: who was um running an MTV Europe it just started,
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 1: and I knew a lot about Europe and um um
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: and they thought I could help them with what was
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 1: programming music pretty much that was full time music. You know,
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: you would be uh, you know they had and at
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: that time it was a pan European channel, which of
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: course couldn't last forever as long as you didn't have
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 1: a you know, a German competitor or a French competitor.
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 1: But as soon as you did, you were in trouble,
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 1: you know. But I work with them then I started
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: working with the US channels and cmt VH one. So
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: what are you doing for these companies? It would depend
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: on what era we're talking about it. If it's the
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: music era, I'm helping them figure out, you know, what
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: the music balance should be. And again I think about
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: the trip I went to MTV Russia and they were
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 1: having trouble with their ratings and I look at the channel.
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 1: It looks like a British channel. I go, where the
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 1: Russian acts? Oh, well, you know, we want to play
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: some of the international hits. I go, You're not gonna
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: get anybody to watch this if you don't support your
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: own acts. Now, it didn't take a genius Bob to
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 1: figure that out. But for me, you was the most
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: obvious thing because I said, you know, you have a
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 1: huge music scene here. You've got to support these acts,
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: you know, um, and then play the international ones. That
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: makes sense. So a lot of the initial stuff was
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: common sense. Uh. And I was able to work with
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: a lot of great talented programmers that I'm still friends
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: with today, you know, and they're doing other things, most
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: of them, but um. So that was the first phase,
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: and then as it got competitive, when we had to
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: switch from a Pan European channel to the local channels,
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 1: and then suddenly we launched local channels. So suddenly we're
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: up against Viva in Germany and you know and the
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: local you know, the local music channels in each one.
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: So then it's you know, how do we use the
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: MTV programming that the international audience is interested in and
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: be local enough that people care about you. So that
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: was you know, that was a big balancing act for
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: for a lot of years after that. And what about
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: when you worked in the US, Well, we were obviously
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 1: UM music and then we launched the what was what
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: came to be known as MTV two. So I was
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 1: involved with that UM and then it would be music events, UM.
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: You know, I always UM was interest did in new
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: technology UM, and so I learned more and more about
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: what digital platforms might provide. So that was something that
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: that I spent some time on as well. And that
• 1:16:16
  Speaker 1: was in the more in the double ohs than the nineties.
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 1: The nineties was really the transition to UM, you know
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: two programming at MTV that was there to get ratings,
• 1:16:32
  Speaker 1: you know, it wasn't you know, Okay, So the uh,
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: the centuries change, and this is one of the few
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: cases with MTV where the audience is behind the station.
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: Now they're going on to the MTV Video Music Awards
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 1: saying play more videos, etcetera. Tom Preston said to me,
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: you know, we're never gonna play videos. That's an on
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: demand item online. Then of course, you know, he gets
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 1: kicked up, then he gets fired. That's it in your estimation.
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 1: Was there any way to save those channels. It's really
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: hard to remain relevant to your target audience and grow.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 1: But MTV did it for a really long time. The
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 1: fact that they could actually and whether it was with
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: you know, Jersey Shore or whatever programming that they did,
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: they managed to do you know, sixteen and Pregnant. They
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: managed to do it through shows and they were able
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 1: as long as Tom was there and Judy and Van,
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: as long as the central core of the people and
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 1: the people they attracted. They really didn't care about yes,
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: the heritage of music, but but but about creating new things.
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: That it was a culture of creativity. That's why so
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: many people who are alumni have gone onto these amazing jobs.
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: But once that team was gone, once Tom was gone
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 1: and then Judy and then Van, you know, um, it
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: was very very difficult to attract the kind of talent
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 1: that would keep uh MTV at the top of their game.
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: So they you know, it's really really difficult to suddenly say, oh,
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 1: here we are again, were relevant, You should care about us.
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: And I would never count them out because you know,
• 1:18:39
  Speaker 1: they're just several great ideas away from recapturing the zeitgeist.
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 1: But you can't. You know, my kids didn't grow up
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: watching MTV. You know, that wasn't what they did. You know,
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: it was something you know, and they're on TikTok on Instagram,
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: And I think that there was a period of time
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 1: when really good people were leaving the company and the
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 1: investment wasn't happening, and really critical time when things were
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 1: shifting in a huge way and MTV, you know, didn't
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 1: shift with it. So now now now it's a question
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 1: of rebooting and they have new people and they're going
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: to have to see if they can come back with
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: a whole new offering. You know. So how did you
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: end up working for Spotify? And what year was that?
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 1: Um that was again me being interested in you know,
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: I was on I'm probably like you were probably two
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 1: of the Americans who are on the early demo from
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 1: Europe and thinking, oh my god, this is incredible. UM,
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: and I met Daniel through some people, and UM, there
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: was a period of time where they weren't very artist friendly.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: Let's say that they really, especially when Jimmy took him
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 1: to task. I mean, Jimmy was Mr. Artist friendly. So
• 1:20:09
  Speaker 1: originally they brought me up, you know, brought me into
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: sort of help on the artist relationship side of things
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: on how because you know, look, they're tech guys, so
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: they that wasn't really in their d n A and
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: that was something I could help them with. Okay, So
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: at this point in time, let's leave Deezer as a
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: secondary outfit. It's really nothing much in the US, especially
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 1: now that are alternatives for high risk. There are three
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: major players, Apple, Spotify, Amazon. Obviously the record industry wants
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: them all to be doing well because they can play
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: them off each other. How does this all play out?
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: I think that five years from now, UH all three
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: will be with us and successful because they're all doing
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: it differently. Amazon's using their giant, giant footprint to allow
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 1: you to access their music UH at a less expensive opportunity,
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: and obviously, you know, using Alexa to help drive that, Um,
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: Apple's doing a solid job. Look, Spotify as the leader,
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: and once you're the leader, and you don't screw up
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: if you continue to do what they do. I think
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: to Daniel's credit, he was always focused on the service
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: and on the U I right, and he wanted it
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: to be easy to use and didn't get distracted. He
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 1: didn't start saying, Okay, let me invest a lot of
• 1:21:57
  Speaker 1: money in exclusives. I mean, that was one of the
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: things when I was there, is don't your right. Don't
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: do exclusives. They don't matter. People don't know. They just
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: don't know, you know. I remember from my radio days.
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: I could be playing a song that was out for
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: six months and people call up it goes, hey, man,
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: I love that new song from you know, fill in
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: the blank. You know, they don't know when it comes out.
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: We in the industry now, but they didn't know. So
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 1: I think, uh that we'll see all three of them
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: do more bundling. Whether somebody decides to buy Spotify, I
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: suppose that's possible. Um, but I think that they're going
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 1: to have to continue to shift. I mean, look, the
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 1: move to podcasting has been a very important move by
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: them to capture advertising revenue because of the fact that
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: there seems to be somewhat of a heeling on how
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: much they can make from subscriptions. Um, and they want
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: the price to go down, and the artists want the
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 1: price to go up right for per stream you know, um,
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: you know, I think that it's um, it's going to
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 1: be a tumultuous next several years in terms of that
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: that particular struggle. Okay, let's jump to the end. What's
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: the status of radio today? Here's your issue with radio.
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: First of all, there are a lot of really good
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: people trying to do their best and are doing their best.
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: This is the role of radio today. I think you
• 1:23:46
  Speaker 1: have Look, I just read a new survey from a
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: couple of days ago which you might have seen, about
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: music discovery and where adults are finding new music, and
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 1: it was a huge lead for Spotify and streaming services
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 1: over radio. And I think that, I mean, look, we
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: got all debate what music discovery really is. Is Phoebe
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: Bridgers music discovery the first time you hear her, even
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 1: though she's been out for a year. I think that
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: though radios function in the ecosystem is to slam the
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 1: accelerator down on a record that's already been getting some heat.
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 1: It is the It is taking a song and making
• 1:24:53
  Speaker 1: it omni present. That's a different role than in going
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: there first to hear new songs. Now you might say
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: a really good Top forty and Top forty is back
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: stronger than ever. Um, you will hear songs for the
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 1: first time. The thing that radio still does well is curate,
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: and that's the thing they should focus in on going forward.
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 1: They curate. They end up taking a song that has
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 1: created some heat, whether it's on TikTok or Instagram or
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: just is viral, and if they jump on it, they
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: can you know, set a fire to it. They can
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 1: be arsonists with with a song. But there are so
• 1:25:42
  Speaker 1: many other places to hear songs. First. I don't even
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: think they should worry about that. Okay, how about you know,
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 1: I hear from radio all the time they say things
• 1:25:51
  Speaker 1: are better than ever. I talked to people under the
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 1: age of twenty. They never listen to commercial radio, never ever. Okay,
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 1: then listen to this series. Yes, that's a different thing.
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 1: Never ever. So what's gonna happen here. What's going to
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 1: happen is that, first of all, there's a large amount
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 1: of people who listen to the radio every week. Those
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: numbers are true. How long may listen is the issue,
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 1: because the issue is whether they will be there. The
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 1: young are not listening to radio like they used to.
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 1: It just they just aren't. And when the easier it
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 1: becomes to listen in the car to your own playlist,
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 1: is what you're gonna do. And the fact that some
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 1: automobiles no longer have an AM radio, I mean, that's unbelievable.
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: And I I want to listen to the Dodger game
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 1: and I gotta listen to it on you know, an
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: HD two channel. You know. So, but there there, they
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: have a significant role. They continue to have a significant role. People.
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 1: They're not sexy, so people tend to throw them over.
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 1: But um, if they understand the role. It's still a
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: good business. If you didn't overpay for a station, and
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: you do a good job in your community, you know.
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 1: I I'm a firm believer that you know, you make
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 1: a good living with it and you you can be
• 1:27:29
  Speaker 1: you know, and it's all about being part of the city. Um.
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: But it is a different role than it used to be.
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 1: And and attracting younger the younger audience is a significant
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: issue for them, and they will just have to continue
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 1: doing And look at they're doing all the things they
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 1: possibly can. I heart with their streaming and you know,
• 1:27:51
  Speaker 1: um what Odyssey is doing, and Um and Cumulus, So
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 1: I think, um, and these are these these are smart
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: people just trying to figure out how they can continue
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 1: to evolve and attract a younger audience. But they have
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 1: so many competitors that it's very difficult to see where
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 1: this ends up for the under thirty crowd, you know,
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: in the next five years. Okay, is rock dead? It's
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 1: on life support? Is it dead? I mean, when's the
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: last time you heard a great rock album? You know,
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: when is the last time that that any of us
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 1: got excited that something entered the culture that actually, uh,
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 1: it is a very you know, the electric guitar has
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 1: gravitated the country music. Um, there's hardly any rock bands around.
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: Nobody wants to be considered rock, you know. I mean,
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: if Coldplay is making records with bts, you gotta start
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 1: saying yourself, Okay, that tells me more about the status
• 1:29:04
  Speaker 1: of rock than about anything else. You know. So, um,
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: it's a very challenging time. And you know, and how
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: many rock acts are really attracting a large live audience
• 1:29:24
  Speaker 1: that aren't over fifty None. Yeah, none, except for maybe
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 1: twenty one pilots. I mean there's very few bands that can.
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: So there's there are exceptions. But when was the last
• 1:29:40
  Speaker 1: time there was a great rock album? Are we going
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: back to okay computer? Are we going back to all
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 1: that you can't leave behind? Are you going back to
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 1: you know um Bruce's album? Uh from uh the you
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: know the Rising Um It's it's bleak out there. If
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 1: you want to be in a rock band. Uh. And
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: I'm insistative to this because my son plays rock music.
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 1: Keep mentioning your children, how old are your children? And
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: which is your son? The twenty year old? So he
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 1: plays in a rock band? Yeah, And I don't know
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: what to tell him about. Let's go the other way.
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: There is a business, just like there was a music
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 1: business before the Beatles. But for those of us who
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 1: lived through the Beatles the seventies until it imploded at
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: the end of the seventies then resuscitated by MTV, we
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 1: saw music and the music represented something different than it
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 1: does today. Now. People still were working in the business
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 1: and they're stripping away people of our vintage constantly say oh,
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 1: it's the same as it ever was. It's not, but
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: I want your take on it. If we're looking at
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: the music out there, you know. And the other thing
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: about it is, yes, music is available everywhere on TikTok.
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: It is about using the music for your own personal expression.
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 1: What is going on with the music? Okay, most of
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: the excitement and innovation and danger and unexpected uh emotion
• 1:31:46
  Speaker 1: and music that resonates in the culture is coming in
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: hip hop. Rock lost that rock used to be. That
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: rock had those attributes, and I think that it's a
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: huge part of why. When you're not part of the
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: culture and you're just making songs and you're not singing
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 1: about anything that's particularly important, it gravitates and it moves
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 1: and it evolves, and if you connect the dots, you
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 1: suddenly see that Nipsey Hustle and j Cole and Kanye
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 1: West are the rock stars of today and they're in
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: and it's they're exciting and they're doing things differently and
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 1: they're challenging you and um and for rock to make
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 1: a comeback, it's going to have to understand that. You know,
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 1: it's not just about the songs. Well, you know, Josh
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 1: how to say day and now is a very minor thing.
• 1:32:49
  Speaker 1: Is rock itself just played out? Well? Rock is? It
• 1:32:54
  Speaker 1: feels like it's sort of a niche format. Now. If
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: you said that me ten years ago, I would I
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: would have believed you. But if you look at the
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: history of the last thirty years, the last twenty five years, uh,
• 1:33:13
  Speaker 1: that's what's happening. And is rock played out? We know
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: for certain that it is in a very weak place
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: creatively and in terms of relevance. It used to be
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: when an album came out, it was everywhere. You heard
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: it everywhere. It was like songs in the Key of Life,
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 1: which was everywhere, or it was you know, it was okay,
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 1: computer you heard everywhere? Or everything is but there aren't
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 1: you know, you have to be part of a conversation
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: that's bigger than what rock is doing. Now it seems
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: like it's a conversation between two people, not the world. Okay,
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: and do you think you know we have the Spotify
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: Top fifty. But in terms of overall reach, the example
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 1: I always use is listening to Top forty radio in
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: the sixties. I knew every lick of Hello Dolly and
• 1:34:21
  Speaker 1: Strangers in the night because I had to wait to
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 1: hear the Beatles songs. They want to miss anything British invasion,
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 1: whereas today you can talk to an incredible number of
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 1: people they haven't they've never heard the number one song,
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: not only oldsters. So this nitrification, is it just going
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: to continue to go this way or is there will
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 1: there ultimately be hits that everybody gravitates to. Well, you've
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 1: pinpointed the issue about awards shows, haven't you, Because ultimately
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 1: what's a hit to somebody? They don't really care about
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: the awards and they certainly don't care about these categories
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 1: and genres that are being attached on the confuses people
• 1:35:08
  Speaker 1: they've stopped watching the award shows because they can just
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: watch the highlights that they want to watch for the
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: artists they already like on YouTube, right they there no
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 1: one's gonna sit through a three hour show when you
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 1: can watch, you know, your favorite act for a minute
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: or two. And so there really isn't a central place,
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: and that's why there is still a role for terrestrial
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 1: radio to play in their various cities by looking to
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: be the central place that defines what are hits or
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: what is getting played so that people know them, um,
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 1: because everywhere or you go, everybody has their their own
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: list of what's a hit. Okay, every week on Thursday,
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 1: you send out an email with five tracks. Check out
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: how do you find those five tracks? There? They can
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 1: frequently be in diverse genres. That is for myself. I've
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 1: all my life, I've pick songs, you know, either for
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 1: music channels or radio or everything else. So I get
• 1:36:29
  Speaker 1: to do this now. I get to pick five songs.
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: I don't worry about whether some of them aren't popular
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 1: at all and never get popular. I don't care. So
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 1: I so I go through all the Spotify new releases
• 1:36:42
  Speaker 1: and get it down to about fifteen and then pick five.
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 1: And they can be in country, they can be a pop,
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 1: they can be in hip hop and not making a
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 1: big statement, they're just making Hey, these are the five
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: songs I like this week. You know I'm not picking
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: up two further appearance on the Grammys, I don't care.
• 1:37:06
  Speaker 1: Tell us about the creation of the Laurel Canyon movie
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: documentary that was on ultimately dreamed on Cable. Well, we
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: started working on that project um some years ago UM
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 1: and it was a really great experience because we originally
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: had been asked to do a film by Epics. Epics
• 1:37:33
  Speaker 1: really was interested in it, and there of course had
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: been another Lawer Canyon Dock, which um had come out
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: while we were working on our. Okay, so yours was
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 1: very different. There's was more exhaustive. To what degree do
• 1:37:48
  Speaker 1: you think reception was hindered by theirs coming first? I
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: don't think so much now at all, because I think
• 1:37:55
  Speaker 1: I think initially there was some confusion, but because of
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 1: the how well, you know, our Laurel Canyon doc didn't
• 1:38:05
  Speaker 1: we got nominated for some awards and things, and I
• 1:38:09
  Speaker 1: think that we you know, we also heard from a
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: lot of the artists who were featured on it that
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: really appreciated how they were depicted. So, you know, we
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: just wanted to do a really good doc and originally
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 1: was supposed to be one part, and then they said, oh,
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: let's do two parts because it's a lot to cover,
• 1:38:33
  Speaker 1: and then we had we we sent in it was
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 1: supposed to be fifty five minutes. We sent in an
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: hour and twenty cut and we got this note back
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 1: that you will never get another note back in the
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 1: history of doing music docs, and that will never happen again.
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 1: I can tell you this. The note back was don't
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 1: cut anything. It was like what So they were an
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 1: amazing partner you. I mean you get to put little
• 1:38:58
  Speaker 1: feet and of a documentary. Who you know who does that?
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: And so that's why we're able to make it so that,
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: you know, I just got so many notes from artists
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 1: saying thank you for just saying the way it was.
• 1:39:12
  Speaker 1: This actually happened this way. And we're lucky enough to
• 1:39:17
  Speaker 1: to license over a hundred songs from that era, Bob.
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: And you can imagine the songs like California Dream and
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: Sweet Judy Blue Eyes, on and on and on. You're saying,
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 1: oh my gosh, but you know it was I mean,
• 1:39:33
  Speaker 1: I grew was your what was your pitch? Because normally
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 1: you would have just blown your budget, um times a
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: number just on the songs. Well, we couldn't. They have
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 1: what's called most Favorite Nations, as you know, and we
• 1:39:47
  Speaker 1: just said this is what we can pay we we
• 1:39:51
  Speaker 1: we can't. You can't include all that music and then
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 1: make exceptions. You can't do it. So fortunately, um and
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 1: this is where the relationships come in, Bob. A sort
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: of people said, look, we like what you've done before.
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 1: We trust that this will be good. We like Allison Elwood,
• 1:40:11
  Speaker 1: you know, we like your eagle Stock, we like you,
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 1: we like the people involved. Um And fortunately people really
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: came back to us and said, okay, you sustained our
• 1:40:26
  Speaker 1: belief in in this. And for me being a Californian
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 1: and growing up that was my music. You know. Look,
• 1:40:34
  Speaker 1: it's we also wanted to make expand the audience. I mean,
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 1: to me, a big part of doing these projects is
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 1: can I somehow create new fans. I don't want to
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: just preach to the choir. I saw the new Todd
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 1: Haynes movie a lot of heat on that, okay, um
• 1:40:58
  Speaker 1: round Velot Underground it and watched it. I just you know,
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 1: for me, it was for the super fan, you know.
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 1: And if you're a super fan, you'll love it. But
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 1: if you're if you are hoping to make a large
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: your audience for the Velvet Underground, it didn't do it
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 1: because it's very, very down a rabbit hole. And and
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: for me, I hope with it. Whether it's Jim Morrison
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: or the monkey Stock we're going to do, or some
• 1:41:28
  Speaker 1: of the other things, you know, whether it's cash or
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: whatever we do, we would like to say we want
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 1: to give people a chance to come in and experience
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: these artists and see why they were so special. That's
• 1:41:47
  Speaker 1: really a goal of mine with these things that I'm doing,
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 1: is can I somehow open the door to new people
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: that aren't just super fan Because if you're preaching to
• 1:41:58
  Speaker 1: the converter, then you're not really making much more than
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 1: the other ones that might have come before you, if
• 1:42:06
  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. So you say you have
• 1:42:09
  Speaker 1: a specific way you want to do the Doors rescued
• 1:42:11
  Speaker 1: from the Oliver Stone portrayal, how do you plan to
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 1: do it? We're gonna bust all those myths. I can
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 1: tell you that so much stuff that was in that
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 1: movie didn't happen, and it was There are so many
• 1:42:27
  Speaker 1: things that uh Jim was like, but when you talked
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 1: to the living members of the Doors, or you're talking
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 1: to Bill Siddons or everything else, they don't I didn't
• 1:42:40
  Speaker 1: even recognize that guy that was in that movie. That
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 1: was Oliver's movie. What about the guy who said, come
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 1: into my room and it's filled with books, Pull down
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: one book, read a passage to me, and I'll tell
• 1:42:55
  Speaker 1: you what book that is. Where's that guy? He wasn't
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 1: an movie? Where about the guy who was so loyal
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 1: to the band, believe it or not. Robbie Krieger, at
• 1:43:07
  Speaker 1: his brand new book which is coming out this month,
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 1: said that Jim had no ego. Now think about that,
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 1: think about the Lizard King. But he never wanted to
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 1: be Jim Morrison and the Doors. He hated that he
• 1:43:27
  Speaker 1: was always the Doors. It was his idea to divide
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 1: the royalties between the band. You know, he was He
• 1:43:37
  Speaker 1: never had any money. He didn't even own a house.
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 1: You know, this guy was really he was like a
• 1:43:43
  Speaker 1: classic artist. And his poetry is you know, I've seen
• 1:43:50
  Speaker 1: a lot of his poetry books are are beautiful. This
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 1: is a guy who did it. Was he a drunk, Yes,
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: he was a drunk, but like a lot of drunks,
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 1: he also was, you know, an amazingly interesting person. And
• 1:44:10
  Speaker 1: if you listen to his interviews, you hear a guy
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: searching for the right word. I've had to look up
• 1:44:16
  Speaker 1: some of his words because of his vocabulary. This was
• 1:44:20
  Speaker 1: a very very smart, intelligent man. And so if you
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 1: said to me, what would you like to accomplish that
• 1:44:27
  Speaker 1: hasn't be said, is I would like to give a
• 1:44:31
  Speaker 1: reappraisal of the lead singer of the Doors as to
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 1: both sides of what he was like, not the guy
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 1: who got drunk and fell off the stage and oh,
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 1: by the way, did not light a closet on fire
• 1:44:47
  Speaker 1: with his girlfriend, and because that didn't happen. I mean,
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 1: if you read Robbie's book, he goes down, he lists
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 1: all the things that never happened. You know, listen, following
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 1: things did not happen. So and you know, unfortunately that
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 1: film is left an impression that the alver Stone film
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 1: of what he was like and what the Doors are like. Now,
• 1:45:14
  Speaker 1: some positive things came out of it for the Doors
• 1:45:16
  Speaker 1: because it reignited some interest in them. But if you
• 1:45:19
  Speaker 1: remember the family, it's not a guy you recognize. And
• 1:45:25
  Speaker 1: what can you add to the monkeys, Well, the monkeys
• 1:45:29
  Speaker 1: are um. I think what's interesting about the monkeys is
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 1: they were super fun and I think what's a what's
• 1:45:44
  Speaker 1: really interesting to consider is how close all the other
• 1:45:49
  Speaker 1: members of the Laurel Canyon scene were with the monkeys.
• 1:45:53
  Speaker 1: They were their buddies and they didn't judge them on
• 1:45:57
  Speaker 1: oh you guys are your music isn't great? Or you
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 1: know what? Everything? They were funny. If you see the
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 1: Peter Tork audition for the Monkeys. I don't know if
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 1: you ever seen that, really a funny guy. And he
• 1:46:12
  Speaker 1: actually even sat in the chair. He went over and
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 1: sat in the chair of the director, and you know,
• 1:46:19
  Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's good. So I'd like to show
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: them how fun they were there since the humor. You know,
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 1: John Lennon was a big fan because he thought they
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: were sort of like the Marx Brothers. Now, um, you know,
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 1: but they also had some amazing songwriters right for them.
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: So I think it's gonna be interesting to sort of visit.
• 1:46:39
  Speaker 1: I think we still have a lot to work on
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 1: from there, but they're not gonna be We're not gonna
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: treat him like just this TV thing. I mean, this
• 1:46:49
  Speaker 1: show is only on for two years. Isn't an amazing
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 1: I know, it's mind blowing, isn't it. And then all
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: these people who who grew they say, I grew up
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 1: with the Monkeys. Oh really, how old are you? I'm forty?
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 1: Oh right. I watched it on MTV because that was
• 1:47:05
  Speaker 1: the first time that the Monkeys ended up having that
• 1:47:10
  Speaker 1: next generation effect was people watching it, and and in
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 1: in the eighties when they watched it, because they never
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: said and if you watch him today, I have a
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 1: friend of mine who shows it to his kids and
• 1:47:21
  Speaker 1: the kids love it. So something, you know, something's pretty
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 1: special about that. Okay, Malcolm Gladwell, and I don't agree
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 1: with a lot of his recent stuff, but ten years ago,
• 1:47:31
  Speaker 1: when Steve Jobs died, he said Steve Jobs will not
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 1: be remembered fifty or a hundred years from now. It's
• 1:47:39
  Speaker 1: certainly looking like he is right. Who of these rock
• 1:47:43
  Speaker 1: acts survive? We're alive, we know them. You know, Neil Diamond,
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 1: he can't go on the road because he's sick. Never mind,
• 1:47:53
  Speaker 1: they're dropping left and right, so we can't see these
• 1:47:56
  Speaker 1: Elvis businesses down. Memorabiliac are because the audience is dead.
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 1: So from our rock era, whose music survives? I mean,
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: I think it's an easier question perhaps when you look
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: at individual songs, you know, but um I think Bowie survives.
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: Um I think Johnny Cash survives. Um I think the
• 1:48:24
  Speaker 1: Eagles survive because if you look at that crazy five
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 1: top five hundred in the Rolling Stone, you know, which
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 1: you and I talked about about, and we know why
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 1: people do countdowns. I did him myself, and I was
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 1: at a radio station count down to get people mad.
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 1: So they engage. It's the whole trick. But you know,
• 1:48:42
  Speaker 1: and by the way, Desperado was not on that list,
• 1:48:47
  Speaker 1: and that song he's going to be listened to hundreds
• 1:48:52
  Speaker 1: of years from now. It's one of the all time
• 1:48:54
  Speaker 1: great songs. It's like a someone to watch over me.
• 1:48:57
  Speaker 1: That's how good it is, you know. Uh so, But
• 1:49:03
  Speaker 1: it's gonna be interesting to see which bands I think
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 1: it's it's it's a it's a tough question. With the Beatles,
• 1:49:11
  Speaker 1: of course, uh who for me is a timeless group.
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 1: That Kinks are a timeless group. Um, but will they
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 1: be in a hundred years? Hard to know whether people
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: will say, are they gonna come all the way back
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 1: and listen to the music, Let's go your way? What
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 1: are the songs that will survive. There's a number of
• 1:49:34
  Speaker 1: Beatles songs, you know. I think that there's a number
• 1:49:38
  Speaker 1: of Stevie Wonder songs and Paul Simon, um, Bruce um,
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 1: you know, Marvin Gay, Uh, Billy Holiday. I can't imagine
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: people won't listen to Strange Fruit a hundred years from now,
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: um Sinatra, um. You know. There's it's really an interesting thing.
• 1:50:09
  Speaker 1: I remember sitting around table with a band who I'm
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: friendly with and we were talking about what are hundred
• 1:50:17
  Speaker 1: year songs? And that's a great question. Then I started
• 1:50:20
  Speaker 1: counting back there's someone to watch over me, and I
• 1:50:24
  Speaker 1: realized that's five years old, right right? Oh my god.
• 1:50:30
  Speaker 1: And it doesn't get any better than that. So, you know,
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 1: it's that's a much more interesting thing than than to
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: come up with a countdown or or a top whatever,
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 1: because you know, there are songs that just say a
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 1: lot about America or about the world at large. Um.
• 1:50:56
  Speaker 1: You know that a song like Yesterday will never be forgotten,
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: you know. Um. So it's a that is a very
• 1:51:11
  Speaker 1: interesting exercise and a big one too. It's really hard
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 1: to have the perspective of will this song last? You know,
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: well will it? Will it last? And it? And how
• 1:51:22
  Speaker 1: does it become a standard? How does it become something
• 1:51:26
  Speaker 1: that becomes part of Well, you know, it's very interesting
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 1: because all the songs you mentioned are based on melody,
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 1: whereas today's Spotify Top fifty is all based on rhythm
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: and beats, and will that decrease its longevity? Well, melody
• 1:51:46
  Speaker 1: will never go away, as the basic thing isn't you know?
• 1:51:51
  Speaker 1: It's the basic core. I mean, Chuck Berry is somebody
• 1:51:56
  Speaker 1: who will always be remembered because I sort of think
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 1: of him as are our Bach where everything follows. I
• 1:52:05
  Speaker 1: had a friend of mine say to me once, he said,
• 1:52:07
  Speaker 1: you know, if you erased all the music that came
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 1: after Bach and he was still there, it would still happen.
• 1:52:16
  Speaker 1: And I think the same thing about Chuck Berry. Yeah,
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 1: it's amazing where it all came from. It all came
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 1: from him. He started. He's ground zero. So that's what's
• 1:52:28
  Speaker 1: what's interesting, you know. And I think of you know,
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 1: we're we're really lucky to live in a time that
• 1:52:37
  Speaker 1: has seen so much, so much change. But the songs
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 1: will be embraced by by generations of people that have melody.
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 1: They're not going to just you know, will satisfaction survive maybe,
• 1:53:00
  Speaker 1: but maybe it's but that's more of a beat. It
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 1: has to have something else, it has to be part
• 1:53:06
  Speaker 1: of something that you know. And and it's hard to
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 1: explain Desperado to somebody who doesn't get it because it
• 1:53:15
  Speaker 1: says so much about America, America that's maybe no longer
• 1:53:20
  Speaker 1: with us America, of the of as we all, as
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: Americans look back to our history. Somehow that song managed
• 1:53:31
  Speaker 1: to do it well, of course you and me both know,
• 1:53:34
  Speaker 1: never a hit single, Never a hit single. It is
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 1: the triumph of the live show, every show, and you
• 1:53:41
  Speaker 1: you know, it's your You can talk to people who
• 1:53:43
  Speaker 1: don't even really seem to be such music fans. They'll
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 1: start testifying about Desperado. Yeah, well, you know, Don Don
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 1: and company wrote a song that that's for the ages.
• 1:53:57
  Speaker 1: It's for the ages, and so it's you know, I
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: think the things that remind us of our history that
• 1:54:06
  Speaker 1: have something to say and also are very simple. You know,
• 1:54:11
  Speaker 1: Yesterday is incredibly simple song. And and the Beatles actually
• 1:54:17
  Speaker 1: have several songs. I mean, as much as I love
• 1:54:20
  Speaker 1: a day and of life, is it really going to
• 1:54:21
  Speaker 1: be remembered a hundred years from now? Hard to see that.
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 1: But maybe something like here Comes the Sun is who knows?
• 1:54:29
  Speaker 1: I mean, I don't think any of us really know,
• 1:54:33
  Speaker 1: and there probably aren't that many songs that maybe you
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 1: choose one is a which is a wonderful song. I
• 1:54:41
  Speaker 1: don't think anything from You Too survives. I mean this
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 1: is a separate conversation from that same Abbey Road album
• 1:54:46
  Speaker 1: Something Survives survives despite the great second side Come Together
• 1:54:53
  Speaker 1: that survives, and uh, there are a lot of bands
• 1:54:57
  Speaker 1: it out a specific sound. I mean, some of these
• 1:54:59
  Speaker 1: people who good friends of mine, but you're not going
• 1:55:01
  Speaker 1: to be listening to their music down the road. It's
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 1: these standards. In any event, Jeff, I think we've come
• 1:55:09
  Speaker 1: to the end of the feeling we've known here. Thanks
• 1:55:11
  Speaker 1: so much for taking the time. You know, I think
• 1:55:14
  Speaker 1: we just hit the high points. There's a lot of
• 1:55:16
  Speaker 1: deeper stuff I certainly have questions about, but this is
• 1:55:19
  Speaker 1: as long as we can go today. Thanks so much
• 1:55:22
  Speaker 1: for having any Bob really appreciated. Until next time, This
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 1: is Bob Less